In this day and age, every parent wants their child to have the best educational experience they can possibly have. Many parents, especially when it comes to their first-born child, search high and low for the perfect place to send their son or daughter.

They do as much research as they can. They interview as many places as they can find. And, they weigh all of the options before them when making their decision. These are all things that parents do and should do. After all, who can blame any parent for wanting the best education for their child?

If both parents in a household work and choose to continue to have both parents working while their children are young, they might start out interviewing and finally deciding on a daycare center to help with their baby during the days when they are at work. This can work out brilliantly for most families for the first few years of the life of their child. Soon, however, if they want their child to begin a serious quest toward getting a head start on their education, they will want to move them to academic preschool activities and not just daycare alone.

Right now, roughly 75% of young children are participating in academic preschool activities and preschool programs. Research has shown that preschool programs really do have a significant impact on the later lives of the children who go through them. Children who participate in academic preschool activities are much more likely to learn to read earlier and to do more complex math problems at a younger age.

There are a great number of benefits associated with academic preschool programs. One of the benefits is found in the grade school readiness that is very often achieved when a child has been through an academically challenging preschool program.

Another way to look at the benefits of academic preschool activities and how they benefit children is to take a look at how many students tend to drop out or not continue with school if they have not participated in preschool programs.

One-quarter of children who would be classified as at-risk children are likely to drop out of high school if they do not have a quality preschool education under their belts. In addition, nearly 60% of children who do not go to preschool will be more likely to skip college altogether. Academic priorities that are established early in life lead to educational standards and goals later.

It is no surprise when one sees parents who want the best for their children. From the very start, parents want their children to get ahead in whatever direction they will eventually choose for themselves. When it comes to a child’s education, the parents make all of the early choices. One of the earliest choices they will make is what kind of daycare service they will choose when the child reaches the age of three or four.

Having the child in daycare may be a necessity given the work schedule of one or more of the parents, and that should be just fine for the first few years. But, when the child becomes the proper age, finding academic preschool activities for the child is a major step beyond daycare activities.

Academic preschool activities will prepare children for kindergarten and grade school in ways that daycare will not be able to do. If you are considering how you want to proceed with the education of your preschool aged child, do some looking around. The more you look, the more you will find quality preschool education programs in your area.